by Diane Hoh
Silently rejoicing, she lifted her arms and pushed upward with all of her strength, tears of pain spilling down her cheeks as her injured elbow screamed a protest.
But her efforts were in vain. The heavy wooden doors never moved. The rattling sound she heard was probably the padlock, securely fastened on the outside.
Jess sagged against the stone wall. No way out … And the hissing continued.
I don’t want to die in here, she thought clearly, her eyes searching through the darkness for help. I have to stop that gas …
It had to be coming from the furnace. Trucker called it the heater from hell, saying it was a huge old thing from the Dark Ages. If it was that big, it shouldn’t be hard to find even in the dark.
I don’t want to do this, she thought, fighting tears. I want out of here!
Biting her lip and swiping at the tears, she told herself angrily, quit whining. Find that gas line!
Gingerly moving forward, Jess took tiny steps, making little circles in the air with first one foot, then the other. Twice, a sneaker came into contact with something, but both times the object was small and soft: a pile of rags, a bundle of old clothing?
She kept going. Her senses alert, she followed the hissing sound until she bumped up against the huge, unmoving pile of metal in the middle of the room … the furnace.
Her headache was growing worse every second, hammering away at her skull. Using her injured arm, she crooked it at the elbow and scooped the bottom of her sweatshirt up against her mouth and nose. Listening carefully, she located the source of the ominous hissing. It was coming from directly below where she stood. She crouched, exploring with her hand. The hand found a cold metal pipe at the base of the furnace. The hissing came from there.
All she had to do now was find the valve, turn it, and the hissing … the gas flow … would stop.
Her fingers moved to the end of the pipe, where the valve would be.
There … was … no … valve.
Someone had removed it.
Someone had made it impossible for her to stop the flow of gas.
Jess sank back on her haunches, moaning, “Oh, no …”
A fit of coughing seized her. She grasped the sides of the boiler to pull herself up and her right hand touched something soft …
There was something caught on a nail above her head, something that felt like old wool. She could use it to cover her mouth and nose.
She tugged, gently at first, then more forcefully. The scrap of soft cloth came off the nail with a tearing sound. She put it over her mouth and nose, pressing it close to her skin.
It helped. But she still had to find a way to stop the gas flow.
Kneeling, she walked on her knees all the way around the metal structure. There had to be a way.
The floor was cold and rough. Through her jeans, she could feel the skin scraping from her knees. There had to be something …
She found nothing on the furnace. But when she gave up her search and sagged back against the wall, something poked her shoulder. She turned around, felt with her fingers. A small, cold, metal wheel with little spokes in the center. It jutted out from the wall and when she followed it with her fingers, it led directly to the furnace.
It was worth a try.
She placed her hand on the small wheel and turned.
But it didn’t move.
She would have to use both hands, no matter how much the effort hurt her elbow.
Gritting her teeth, she tried again. And was rewarded with the tiniest of movements and a loud creaking sound. Again, and again, and again, she threw her weight behind her turning motion, groaning aloud with the terrible pain in her left arm.
“I am going to do this, do you hear me?” she shouted. “I am!”
Slowly, so slowly, the creaky old valve moved in a gradual circle until she could turn it no more.
The hissing stopped.
Jess sank back on her heels again, sobbing gratefully.
But the air in the cellar was still poisonous. She had to get out of there.
It was then that she saw the window. High up on the front wall. The glass was so filthy it was gray, and blended into the wall as if it were just another block of stone.
It was small, and very high up.
Coughing spasmodically, her left arm and her head throbbing, Jess used her feet to push a heavy trunk into place directly underneath the window. With that in place, she stuffed the woolen square into a back pocket of her jeans. Her hand free, she yanked an old wooden chair onto the top of the trunk.
She was breathing hard from her efforts, but her “ladder” was in place.
Carefully, slowly, she climbed onto the trunk and then onto the chair seat, balancing gingerly as she stood up straight and found her chest even with the windowsill.
She heaved a sigh of relief.
And, a minute later, began weeping with rage because the window wouldn’t open. The latch, like the valve, was old and rusted and petrified within its little metal hook.
There was only one way she was going to get out through this little window. Smashing glass was dangerous. Hadn’t they nearly been sliced to ribbons by the exploding mirror in Linda’s room? But being on the outside with a few scratches would be better than remaining in this dark, clammy hole unscratched.
Reaching down and backward, she pulled off one of her sneakers to use as a hammer. It took several blows of increasing strength to shatter the first pane. Fresh air flowed in, and Jess gulped it in gratefully.
She made short work of the remaining three panes. As she slammed away with the shoe, she was vaguely aware of stinging sensations on her hands, neck, and face, but she ignored them. She would worry about any damage done later, when she was free.
With the glass gone, it took her only a few more minutes to destroy the old, rotting wood that had held the panes in place.
Then she put her shoe back on and hoisted her body through the small opening, praying she wouldn’t get stuck on her way out. She cried out in pain when her injured elbow slammed against the stone wall, but she kept going, hauling her legs up behind her and thrusting her body out over the sill onto the ground.
She was free. Her head ached, her arm burned with pain, and her stomach heaved with nausea, but she was free.
Gasping in cool, fresh air, she lay limply on her stomach, too exhausted, for the moment, to push herself upright. She closed her eyes in relief.
When she opened them a moment later, the first thing she saw was a pair of dirty white sneakers with orange laces.
Someone was standing over her.
Chapter 22
JESS WAITED FOR A cry of, “Why, Jess, what are you doing down there?” And a gentle hand to help her up.
But no cry of sympathy came, no hand reached down to help her. The only sound breaking through the cool darkness was her own ragged breathing.
Then a voice from above whispered, “Oh, please, don’t get up on my account.” And a sneakered foot came down on her back, pinioning her to the ground.
Her blood froze.
He’d been waiting for her.
“Think you’re pretty smart, don’t you?” the voice hissed. “Getting out of the cellar … you weren’t supposed to do that, Jess.”
He knew her name. And there was something about the voice … But it was only a whisper. She couldn’t identify a whisper.
“Couldn’t leave well enough alone, could you? You were the only one who caught on … Giselle’s death had already been forgotten. But you guessed the truth when you read that letter you found, didn’t you?”
If she could just lift herself up, she would be able to see who it was. But with his foot pinning her down, she was helpless. Not being able to see him when he was so very close was maddening. And terrifying.
“I knew you were lying when you said you had a headache. You were going to look for those letters, that’s why you wanted to be alone. Busybody!” The whisper deepened. “You lied, like Giselle lied. She said she would ma
rry me, but she only said that to humor me. So I’d let her go off to college. She said it was just for one year. Then we’d get married, she said.” The whisper spat fury at Jess. “But she lied! I knew it when she didn’t answer my letters or phone calls.”
And Jess knew then that he was going to kill her. She was going to die right here on the ground in front of Nightingale Hall, behind the wall of shrubbery. Her body might not be found for days.
“I … I didn’t find the letters,” she stammered.
A whispered laugh. “Well, I know that! I found them. In the trunk. And I hid them. But you guessed the truth. I can’t have that. I really can’t.”
Jess’s arms were free, outstretched on either side of her. Her hands explored the darkness, fumbled … there had to be something … a rock, a stick, some weapon …
Her left hand encountered something sharp … a shard of glass from the broken cellar window. It was thick, and the sides were razor-sharp. When her fingers curled around it, the edges dug into the skin of her palm. But it was all she had, and she bit her lip to keep from crying out in pain.
And then he was on her, straddling her back, and something thick and rough was encircling her throat. A rope, digging into her skin. It hurt.
She knew she had only seconds. He was going to tighten the rope, cut off her air, strangle her.
Just as he’d strangled Giselle.
Jess’s hand tightened on the piece of glass. Sticky warmth flowed from her palm. But she held on.
He was leaning forward over her, his mouth close to her ear. “Take your last breath, Jess. It will feel delicious. The last one always does. Just ask Giselle …”
The noose tightened, shutting off her air supply. She was still feeling weak and sick from the gas in the cellar, and her head began to swim.
In one desperate, swift movement, she brought her left arm up and backward, slashing wildly with the piece of glass.
Her attacker shouted an oath. The rope around her neck eased its grip.
And then the driveway was illuminated by a bright yellow light, and there was the crunching sound of tires on gravel.
The weight left her back, taking the cruel rope with it. “Damn!” came an angry whisper. “You’ll be sorry for this! You’ll pay!” And the sneakers turned and ran.
Jess tried to lift her head. A car? Jon’s BMW? Her friends were home. She wouldn’t be alone now. He wouldn’t come back now, because he couldn’t deal with all of them.
But it wasn’t them. The yellow glow faded as the car backed out of the driveway. It had only been turning around.
If he saw that, would he come back? Or was he long gone? She should get up, should run, run … but she was so dizzy …
I’m still alive, Jess thought, dazed. I didn’t die, like Giselle.
But … he wasn’t “finished” with her.
She tried to get up. She had only made it to her knees when a wave of dizziness slammed her back to the ground, eyes closing as she fell, unconscious.
Chapter 23
JESS WAS JOLTED BACK to consciousness by the slamming of car doors, followed by laughter, as Jon’s BMW arrived home and everyone jumped out and began to run to the house through the light rain.
She heard Ian say, “Hey, Jess didn’t leave any lights on for us. Can’t see my nose in front of my face. Trucker, go hit the lights, will you?”
Jess’s voice was so weak, she had to call out four times before they heard her. Several more minutes passed before they located her behind the wall of bushes.
Jess immediately began babbling her story. But no one could make any sense of it. When the lights came on, they helped her into the house. Seated on a chair in the hall, she calmed down enough to tell her story, although her voice shook. “He … he said he wasn’t finished with me,” she concluded, shivering with fear and cold.
“How long have you been lying out there?” Ian asked. “Your clothes are soaked, and you’re freezing.” He took off his windbreaker and wrapped it around her.
“I don’t know. A long time, I guess. I was so afraid he’d come back, I tried to get up. But I must have fainted.”
It was Cath who asked, “Did you see who it was, Jess?”
“No. But he had orange laces in his shoes. The glow-in-the-dark kind.”
“Well, that’s no clue,” Jon said. And Jess knew he was right. They sold those by the thousands at the bookstore. It was a cheap way to promote the school’s colors. Everyone wore them.
As one, they glanced down. Everyone except Cath, in black ballet slippers, had orange-laced sneakers.
Trucker returned, reporting, “It was the master switch. Someone flipped it off. Why would someone do that?”
Ian sensed that Jess wouldn’t want to repeat her story, and filled Trucker in on why someone had done that.
Trucker’s thick, dark brows furrowed together in a scowl. “Man, I don’t believe this! A gas leak? Jess, you okay?”
She nodded, but that hurt her head, so she stopped.
“You never should have stayed here alone,” Linda scolded, but she patted Jess’s shoulder at the same time. “But … but I never thought someone would try to … kill you!”
“You didn’t see anything?” Ian asked. “Maybe we should search the cellar, see if he left any clues.”
Jess lifted her head. “There was something.” Grimacing in pain, she reached into her back jeans pocket for the swatch of fabric she had held over her mouth and nose in the cellar. “This was hanging on a nail above the furnace.”
The small square was maroon. The fabric was soft, worn, and heavy.
“Like a baseball jacket,” she mused aloud, fingering the material. “I’ve … I’ve seen a jacket like this … somewhere …” Then, “I remember. It was in Milo’s room. That day we—” She glanced around. “Where is Milo? Didn’t he come home with you?”
“He didn’t go with us,” Jon said. “Changed his mind. Said he had something he had to do.”
Jess regarded him with thoughtful eyes. “Milo didn’t go to the party with you? He was … he was here?”
“Well, of course he wasn’t here,” Linda said crossly. “He’d have helped you if he were here. He said he had to go somewhere.”
Jess sat quietly, lost in thought, shivering in Ian’s windbreaker. When she spoke again, it was to ask Trucker, “When you were in the cellar getting that trunk for Avery McKendrick, why did you come upstairs?”
“Milo wanted a soda.”
“Milo sent you upstairs?” Jess clamped her lips together. “So he could be alone with the trunk?”
“Jess!” Linda cried. “What are you thinking?”
Jess stood up. “I’m going upstairs now,” she said distinctly, “And I’m going to search Milo’s room. Anyone who wants to, can help me. But,” directing a level gaze at Linda, “no one is going to stop me.”
“You need dry clothes,” Cath said. “You’re soaked and you’re shivering.”
“Later.”
They all followed her up the stairs. She stopped at her room to collect the one letter she’d found, stuffing it into a pocket of her jeans. Then they moved on to Milo’s room, where everyone but Linda, who remained stubbornly in the doorway, arms folded over her chest, helped Jess search Milo’s room for the missing letters.
It was Jess who found them. They were paper-clipped together, without envelopes, in a bottom dresser drawer under a jumble of T-shirts.
“You can stop looking for the letters,” she announced, taking the sheets of paper to the unmade bed and sitting on it. “I found them.”
Everyone fell silent as Jess began reading.
Hey, Babe,
How come I haven’t heard from you? No letters, no phone calls. When I call there, they say you’re not home. You shouldn’t be out so much. You’re supposed to be studying. They wouldn’t be lying to me, would they? You wouldn’t be telling them to, would you? You’d better call me.
It was signed only, Your Forever Love.
The sec
ond letter was angrier:
Giselle,
If I don’t hear from you soon, I’m coming out there. We had a bargain. You had to have one year of college, you said. Then you’d marry me, that’s what you said. Now, I think you were lying. I think you just said that to get away from me. You shouldn’t have done that. If that’s what you did, you’ll be sorry.
Your Forever Love
Linda moved into the room, her eyes wide with apprehension.
Jess read the third letter:
Giselle,
I’ve been patient. I’ve given you plenty of time to call me. Now my patience is gone. Did you really think I’d just let you go? I can’t do that. You’re my forever love, remember? If you met some rich college guy, you can forget about him. You belong to me. Forever. You have one more chance to call me and tell me you’re coming with me in June. Don’t fail me, Giselle. I don’t want to have to punish you.
Your Forever Love
“He doesn’t sound very loving,” Cath commented.
“The letter I found in my room,” Jess said, pulling it from her pocket, “has to be the last one. It’s the angriest one.”
Giselle,
Your time has run out. I’m coming to get you and you’d better be ready to come with me. I’m not taking no for an answer.
Your Forever Love
Jess dropped the letter and lifted her head. “And I think that ‘no’ is the answer that Giselle gave him. But I don’t think he accepted it.”
“What are you talking about?” Linda asked. Her face was bone-white.
She knows what I’m going to say, Jess thought. Poor Linda. “I don’t think Giselle McKendrick committed suicide. I think the person who wrote these letters killed her and made it look like suicide.”
“Well, it wasn’t Milo!” Linda cried, backing away from Jess.
“Linda.” Jess began ticking items off on her fingers. “He lied about knowing Giselle. He volunteered to go into the cellar to help Trucker with her trunk, and then sent Trucker upstairs so he could look through the trunk for the letters. Don’t you get it, Linda? The letters are what Milo was looking for in our rooms. We thought it was vandalism, but it wasn’t. He was searching for the letters.”